Dark Paradise: Mysteries in the Land of Aloha – Palm It Off On Murder

In this one, the author a character, or at least bears the author’s name. The author likes to incorporate herself and her real boyfriend into her stories, so how much of the characters’ behavior and lives are real and how much are fictional? That adds a bit of fun to it.

The narrator is a chiropractor who’s also a master of Shaolin Temple Kung Fu. (Isn’t every chiropractor these days?) His girlfriend (who bears the author’s name) is a palmist. He prefers logical, scientific thinking, she prefers mystical thinking.

A new patient (referred by his girlfriend) dies of a drug overdose in his adjusting room. Turns out the heroin she was using was poisoned. The police visit his girlfriend’s home, and find a baggie of poisoned heroin taped underneath the girlfriends table after she was visited by a notorious drug dealer named Asian Ace. (That strangely enough, the police don’t seem to know what he looks like?)

The whole ‘scientific vs mystic’ thing is pretty simpleminded. If palmistry and such things are your thing, you’ll enjoy this story quite a bit. (Since she’s writing the story, you can guess which side “wins”.)